The Coming Election

 On Halloween Day in 1864, congress admitted Nevada to the union as the 36th state.  Nevada failed to meet the required number of citizens, 60,000 by fully one-third; however, her rich silver mines and her promise to support President Lincoln in the 1864 election carried the day.  

We are nearing a national election which could very well turn on whether or not genuine Believers are willing to set aside personal considerations in order to insure that a candidate whose stated positions are so contrary to Biblical principles is not elected.

Time and again the citizenry are disheartened as elected officials allow political expediency to trump their campaign promises.  However, now is not the time to crawl into a virtual cave and give in to the sense of hopelessness which continually whispers, “What is the use anyway?”  Rather, now is the time to dig down deeply and stand up for your faith based principles.  Every Christian Citizen must become a sacrificial statesman willing to put his future, his wealth, and his life on the line for the cause of truth in these days.

Compare the stated positions of the two candidates: (1) One Supports abortion without limits–the other does not. (2) One candidate openly supports an organization which is instigating mass civil disorder in many cities while one calls for the arrest and prosecution of those who are destroying property.. (3)  One candidate favors statehood for both Washington D.C, and Puerto Rico, while the other believes that such political dependencies should not become states. (4) One candidate believes the failed socialism of Europe & South America should be tried here–the other is a strong proponent of free enterprise. (5) One candidate believes the way to curb violence is to confiscate legal guns from the citizenry, while one believes strongly in the Second Amendment.  (6) One candidate believes the government can more effectively use your earnings than you and wants to repeal tax cuts while adding additional taxes–the other candidate believes the American people can be trusted with the funds they earn, and that increased taxes is counterproductive to strengthening the economy. (7) One candidate believes that he can legislate the way churches and religious communities exercise their worship, while one believes that Freedom of Worship should not be abridged by government.

 

Now, I’m not going to tell you who believes what.  You have several days to ascertain which is which.  The time has come to stand up and be counted by determining the truth, and voting in a manner consistent with Biblical principles.

Should God visit upon us a season of chastisement as He occasionally did National Israel by raising up a leader contrary to His way, we should not despair.  We stand by His grace and not by our strength, riches, or ingenuity.  I believe God has blessed America because of our willingness to export the “Good News” of Jesus Christ.  The opportunity to continue to utilize our bountiful resources to that end could cease as we become more and more pre-occupied with own comfort and prosperity.  The season of chastisement would be occasion to re-evaluate our priorities and turn once again to the ultimate calling of all genuine Believers found in Matthew 28:18ff.

Nevada would eventually have become a state, but political expediency caused the bending of rules and suspending of hard and fast criteria to insure the re-election of President Lincoln.  Let us not compromise Biblical principles for the empty promise of a life of ease where everyone sits on his own ivory couch under his own fig tree.

What Next From SCOTUS?

Early Christians were willing to face any amount of torture rather than agree that the state (Caesar) held authority over Christ’s Church.  They understood that there could only be one LORD.  Either Jesus Christ is LORD, or the state is.

During the first three hundred years of Church History, the state dominated the political, economic, and cultural environment.  However, in the early fourth century, an emperor arose who wed the state with the church, and the Holy Roman Empire was birthed.  Now, Rome had been the predominant world power for about four hundred years, but now ostensibly the state and Church would share power.

The result of this marriage was a thousand years of darkness where churchmen became rulers of men through their dark alliance with various governments, so that tyranny under the papal clerics was worse than any under secular governments. 

The American Founding Fathers understood that government and religion could not be wed.  They incorporated into the Constitution guarantees for the free exercise of religion, even while establishing secular government as the political and economic power.  Religion had no authority over the state, but neither could the state subsidize, limit, or show preference to religion. 

The Supreme Court of the United States has affirmed that position time and time again until Friday, May 29, 2020.  The decision of John Roberts to join with the liberal wing of the SCOTUS and allow the state of California to limit church attendance in effect, authorizes the state to define what does and does not constitute a church.  Something heretofore steadfastly opposed by SCOTUS.

What does it mean in practical terms?  Local municipalities will be energized to limit churches, they might even go so far as to determine that enough churches exist and prohibit the establishment of new ones.  In times past local entities have tried to define churches by the number of attendees and/or income.  One entity in a Mid-Western State went so far as to say that a body was not a church unless such and such percentage of the income was for pastoral support.  The SCOTUS rejected each and every attempt to define church by government entities UNTIL YESTERDAY.

Conservative churchmen have long felt that the time is rapidly approaching when Genuine Believers will be separated from the cultural christians which seem to make up a large portion of church memberships.   With the advent of radical feminism, the homosexual agenda, metooism, and now the pandemic fear; the stage is set for the state to define legitimate church activities by the degree with which the church agrees with and practices what the state promotes.  The rumblings can already be heard within the bowels of once staunch Biblical bodies, as more and more justification for acquiescence to state edicts are expounded from once sound pulpits across the land. 

That Believers in America have become soft, lazy, and ineffective ambassadors for Christ is almost without dispute.  Socially acceptable pastors, and deacons invited in the debauched settings without a word of rebuke being raised demonstrates the weakness of the so-called spiritual leaders of today.  Each time I consider the lives of those who stood for Biblical principles and the consequences they paid, I shudder to think in America today, the most celebrated of men are often pulpiteers who stress blending to the extent that they are almost spiritual Neville Chamberlains.  “It is only a little bit, this compromise we make,” they opine. 

Time and again, I return to the analogy of my Grandfather’s pasture gap which was sealed by five round poles resting in notches in the fence post.  At one point someone was in a hurry and failed to replace the top pole, well that wasn’t bad because there were still four and the cows were still contained.   Then one day a boy broke the current top pole while climbing over it.  Again, there remained three poles to restrain the cows from wandering from the pasture.  However, that very afternoon, one of my uncles ran over one of the poles and broke it.  Now, only two poles remained, and new poles needed to be cut because now the cows could just step across.  That is exactly what happened, the cows always thinking the grass was richer and greener outside the pasture, were soon in Grandmother’s garden.  When the boys returned with the poles, they had much, much bigger problems.  Winter’s food was being devoured by the cows which were simply doing what comes naturally to them.

In much the same way, government is naturally inclined toward control.  As long as government is contained and limited by the Constitution and those limits are supported by SCOTUS, people are mostly safe and prosperous.  But once those poles in the gap begin to come down, they are almost impossible to put back before irreparable damage is done.

EVEN SO, COME LORD JESUS!

TODAY'S GUERRILLA WARFARE

On March 14, 1954 a force of 40,000 Vietnamese guerrillas began the attack on about 15,000 French troops at Dien Bien Phu.   The French assumed their superior armaments and artillery would demoralize and eventually destroy the attacking force.  However, they underestimated the effectiveness of guerrilla warfare.  On May 7, 1954 Ho Chi Minh’s troops over ran the French positions bringing about Vietnam’s independence from France, and ending a war which had turned the tide of public opinion in France against the war.

The American Army of the West was forced to contend with the unconventional warfare utilized by the Native American Indians whose attack and retreat methods coupled with their ability to launch deadly assaults from hiding created such unease that time and again the forward progress of the nation was stalled, and Eastern newspapers reflected a growing frustration with the military’s failure to affect a speedy victory over the disparate tribes.

Fidel Castro made guerrilla warfare so popular in the Western hemisphere, as he operated from remote mountains to eventually overthrow and depose Fulgencio Batista of Cuba in 1959, that revolutionaries sprang up in nearly every Central American Country.   The “Big Stick” diplomacy of Theodore Roosevelt evolved to a “Walk Softly” approach as the Communist advanced inexorably forward under the leadership of Castro disciples like Che Guevara who became the spiritual leader of revolution in the Banana Republics, due in no small part to the fear of entanglement in more prolonged, costly, and painful guerrilla warfare.

Then the ominous and effective tactics of Ho Chi Minh, when once again pitted against overwhelming military power, led to the disenchantment of yet another nation as America lost her will to defend an embattled people.  The public clamoring for an end of American participation in the bloody conflict, led to an ignominious retreat from Saigon and the consignment of millions of Vietnamese to the brutal atrocities perpetrated by their new communist masters.

Ho Chi Minh, an autocratic dictator who ruled by force of arms,  was not constrained by the need for popular support.  Casualties, wrought in pursuit of the ultimate goal of victory, were little more than logistical inconveniences.  Hoards of sapper squads penetrating defenses in suicidal attacks did little to affect military victory, but the emotional effect they left on the fragile psyche of a soft American populace cannot be overstated.

Today, America again stands against multiple foes who are little influenced by public opinion or the need for popular approval.  While these enemies give little thought to affecting a military victory, they are purposeful and vicious in their attacks upon the soft underbelly of the collective American psyche.    Lacking the firm resolve with which to confront these enemies we might well return to the wavering and mushy “jello diplomacy” of the late 1970's & the Obama years.

Middle Eastern Terrorism, Chinese Expansionism, and Russian Militaristic Intrigue have been relegated to back burner priority as the Covid-19 pandemic has decimated the nation’s once explosively dynamic economy.  And the battle raging across the fruited plain has devolved into a blame game, as leftists on the West Coast, Big Cities, and Upper East Coast, with a complicit national media, seem more intent on attempting to discredit a President, than in returning the country to her former prosperous, powerful, and influential position.

Never doubt that the guerrilla tactics of the main players have lessened, however.  China’s actions in the aftermath of the spread of the Huwan originated virus have exposed that countries leadership as ruthless and ambitious for world dominion, while Russia appears to be playing their typical waiting game as they foment confusion and probe for weaknesses which will allow them to gobble up yet another indefensible country.    The Middle East Terrorists, meanwhile, are experiencing fewer disposable monies directed toward terrorism because of the oil glut and decline in demand for oil.

Perhaps the most odious participants in the current drama are the Pelosi/Schumer liberals who are continually attempting to hijack every initiative by attaching onerous plan after onerous plan intended to build some measure of political capital, rather than affirm integrity and statesmanship.  They obfuscate to the degree that their tactics seem drawn from the Guerrilla Tactic Handbook.

What lies ahead should we not stand firm and establish policies which will deliver us from dependence upon these self-serving governments whose sole desire is to subjugate and/or destroy America, is a repetition of both real and contrived crises until the American people either capitulate, or rise up and strike out decisively against our foes.

I believe the greatest threat to world peace would be our unwillingness to seize this moment in history to re-establish our complete independence and become once again self-reliant.  I pray our politicians and the American Public grasp this moment.